claymation character design

speed painting translucent dancer

speed painting 35 mins, did this for the dmuga speedtacular facebook group, the theme was a translucent dancer.

Web design client visuals

first ever animatic pictures

The big interactive media clearout

just clearing my hard drive of all old college work, ill put it on here, best place for it.

I can do photoreal ..... so what now?

I did not finish the digital 2 point perspective peice, well not properly anyway. I thought to myself I can paint photo real but I have achieved nothing. I thought what is the point of doing a digital paintover that looks like a photograph if the original photgraph is crap? there is no point, the image is too real and I dont like it.

So now it comes back to my fear of failure, a fear of failing to produce a decent pencil drawing. It seems that the only way to get feedback on dmu facebook is to do a digital painting, no one seems to give a crap about traditional  media anymore, me I like getting my hands dirty, be it paint, charcoal or clay, i like the feeling my pencil makes as it marks across the paper, I like getting graphite stick on my hands and face. I can do digital, but its not the same.

Here is the half finished digital peice, I got bored with it

I decided to do a pencil drawing aswell, here it is below.




Honestly I like the traditional media better.  I think there is more focus on the main area of the building and the way the empty space/clouds between the sky and the building seem to let the image breathe.

I was told by one of the 3rd years that visual design dosent matter it is game production that is the most important, I was also told not to believe everything the 2nd and 3rd years say. Well visual design matters to me just as much as game production, I feel I am progressing well and I love every minute of both, it is quite something to take 3d and turn it into a 2d image, then back into 3d again. I do want to become a well rounded artist at the end of the day not just a digi freak.  You can learn any peice of software, what  it take to use you own hands to create a peice of art without relying on any software is something else entirley.

digital painting 2 point perspetive progress

Digital painting in progress

 

long way to go yet, thought id post my work up as im working on it, i do make mistakes I am only human after all. I thought id go for the photo real look this time.

The medieval archway vis design....

thought id post my medieval archway up.....

its not finished..... ill wait to see if the visual design teacher says the perspective is wrong first before I do anymore to this.

My love for the pencil.

One visual design session, just one thats all it took to help me remember, remember how to draw and my love for pencil drawing.

Now ive got it back, I can only get better, The sky is the limit.

Bootcamp starts tommorow

Well Game art bootcamp starts tommorow, I'm way past being nervous at this point Im also way past excitement, I'd say I was in a state of anxiety, anxious for things to start so I can get into the flow of things.


Im really looking forward to the Games production /3D part, Im not as anxious about this as the rest of the course, because I know from past experience that software is created for the user so you just have to know/learn the steps to take to use it.

Im looking forward to the visual design part, It will be nice to sit and draw with someone telling you if your doing it right or not, sitting and drawing is relaxing, I just cant wait to become a better artist, and I will become a better artist, no matter how many hours I have to put in.


I dont know about critical studies yet, Im not entirley sure what it involves, so I cant really say if im anxious about it or not.....
so heres to the next 3 years, cheers.
Victoria

Summer project - Finale

My uni summer project was to make an object of our choice using a peice of A1 paper, glue and a craft knife. I love 3d sculpture, it has always been something that I have enjoyed. I made a half sunken pirate ship out of paper I used paper for everything including the rope, where I twisted thin lengths of paper.

I have posted a few pictures of the final peice from different angles. Better than anything I did at college but is it good enough?

I made it more accurate

This is at "sharpley rocks" nr coalville, leicestershire. You can see the monestry in the background. These rocks are the oldest rocks in england.

Free Lupin III wallpapers

I love this character, back from the days when japanese cartoons were cool and not annoying, and when the style was not overdone. I decided to make some wallpapers based on my fave parts of the film as I couldnt find any decent ones on the web.
feel free to use them.

I got my favourite screen shots fom the film and then drew over them using old faithful (my baby the graphics tablet)I think I was pretty accurate, then I painted them in photoshop so they would look clear and colourful.

My favourite shot above from when Lupin threw the goat bills out of his car, a classic moment from the film, "the castle of cagliostro"

 

 Lupin and Jirgen (another wicked character) play rock,paper,scissors to determine which of them will change the flat tire, Lupin wins of course.

 

Lupin and Jirgen leap over rails after they rob the casino, watching this part the sound effect as they jump always makes me smile.

 Lupin and pops meet in the dungeon, pops calls him a little weasel but they are both trapped so they have to work together.

 

Cant decide? then have them all, in this ultimate wallpaper.
enjoy, victoria.

Digital painting landscapes second attempt

After my first attempt at digital painting landscapes I decided to spend some time in the summer practising. I am confident with a graphics tablet and have been using one for nearly a year and I can honestly say that it is the best piece of equipment I have ever purchased.

The main problem I have with doing anything that takes skill is patience, I tend to rush things before boredom sinks in but this time I took a little extra time to pay attention to the detail. Admittedly I didn't take that much time and I could have taken more time on this piece but it is something I have to learn to do, I am gradually getting there.

I am going to show my first and second attempt in this post to show how much improvement I have made in only two attempts.The main thing That is different about the above two pieces is the composition.

 While the first looks flat and uninteresting, the second is layed out better and the rule of thirds is evident, as well as depth in the piece, it is also more realistic. The colour and lighting are better in the second, the first piece looks cartoon and the colour a little fake, the only exception being the sky.

The colour and lighting are not spot on yet..... saying that from what I have learned, unless someone tells you exactly how to do it, it is practice that makes perfect.

Here is my second attempt again, slightly larger this time so the detail is evident.

There are only two weeks left until uni starts. The summer project requires a few finishing touches, Im past exitement now, I just cant wait to get the boring induction week out of the way and get down to some hard work.

My two most valuble lessons

I have learnt two really important lessons over the last 3 months that I have been struggling for years to learn, all I can say is that things happened this summer to make my viewpoints change, and it couldnt have come at a better time.

lesson one. Dont care what other people think! 
This one was a long time coming, I realised that HONOUR is more important than REPUTATION, its not what other people think about you, its what you know about yourself. If you know in your heart that you are good enough/can do it/are not like that etc... who cares what they think. I dont. Not anymore. I can take constructive criticism, but I dont care about criticism when it isnt constructive.


lesson two. Have self confidence!
This was the only thing that has ever held me back, well not anymore. I realised this summer that if you believe in yourself and you are confident in yourself no matter what you look like/feel like etc.. it can have many benefits. I have self confidence now and I have reaped the benefits, made many new friends and had the courage to cast aside those which dragged me down.  I am independant. I have also got to know myself better and feel free to be who I really am, and I feel free now.

So the good, bad and strange experiences I have had this summer have helped me grow as an individual, and i feel now that nothing can ever stand i my way and if it does I am confident i can overcome it.

 

big decision

I have decided to keep this blog as my game art blog, I'll change the design a bit but I think it would be good to keep an online diary of my acedemic life, from college through to uni, why have 2 blogs? im gonna just stick it all on here. :)

Uni summer project...

If anyone reads this who thinks they know me then they may be thinking that I have spent the summer worrying about uni. They are wrong, I have been looking forward to it and i'm really exited, I cant wait to be honest.

We have this summer project, In a nutshell we have to take an A1 peice of paper, glue and a craft knife and see what we can make with them. I found an artist online that does something similar, his name is Peter Callesen.
check out his work.

 This design is quite a simple idea, but I think it looks so good, just as good as the more complex designs, like the castle below.

 I can imagine that one of peers will do something weird and freaky like this, not mentioning any names but....

 I do like the way that the artist has used just one peice of paper and included everything. The cut out part sort of acts as negative space, I like this idea.

I can imagine the work you would have to put in to get this right, lovely hard work, hours of it :), I miss that.

The truth is I already know what I am doing, its weird because you dont know what anyone else is doing, that could be good though, you can do what you want without there influence.

I will post it up when I have done, Im going to town with this one. DMU here I come.

Random speed painting - random object 5 mins

Influence by boredom, looking around the room, I challenged myself to a 5 minute object speed paintd based on the stimulation around me.

back to my art

Finally the anniversary picture is finished and I can get back to finishing my digital paintings of the countryside near where I live. I find I am more busy in the summer, shopping to do, hospital appointments,  and rhurbarb crumbles to make (making the most of that summer fruit), spring cleaning that has been put off until now because I didnt have time, I dont know how I found the time to do all these things when I was at college.
It seems theres not much time,
but anyway, the jobs are done so its time to crack on with the pics cant wait until I'm finished.

im going back

Im going back to the place I was drawing yesterday afternoon, up near warren hills road to take some pictures, I'm making the most of this sunny afternoon, Sketching is fine but I cant remember the colour of things from a mere sketch even notes dont help much, maybe ill do some paint overs, A photograph is also good to help you get the proportions right.
ill just make a quick drink, I think ill take the children too, they like it up there.

I managed to take some good pictures, here is my favourite one of the lot, and this is the one I want to work on, I like how everything is in proportion in this shot. The weather was not so miserable this time round, so the lighting was different. It would be good to see if I could capture that in a digital painting.

Watch this space

Ive been sketching today in the countryside nr coalville, ill post up thefinal artwork when its done, but unfortunatley ive been asked to compose a digital portrait for someones wedding anniversary which I cant afford to say no to, my only worry is that my deadline is mid week, even I know my limits.

Anyway.... when thats out the way I can get back to my landscape paintings.

Digital painting- Its time to get good.

Preparing for uni this summer I have decided to go out and sketch parts of the north west leicestershire landscape to improve my drawing skills before september when i start my degree.
After seeing some of the existing work that current students at the uni have done, I knew that it was time to get good and fast, the last thing I want is to be a laughing stock in september.
I went out into the countryside and produced a few random sketches of the landscape, I have never done a landscape using a graphics tablet before, and i knew that thats what they did at uni, and they were amazing.

This is my first attempt at a landscape, using digital media. It was based on a very rough sketch,

My gaming history

I thought I'd write a piece about my own life experience with games. I was born in 1982 so it was near the beginning for video games, I remember that my dad had a computer in our house is was a commodore 16 which had 16 KB ram, which if you don't know isn't enough memory to store a jpeg (not that it could be displayed anyway). My dad wrote a naughts and crosses game for me and my brothers and sisters, it was really basic there was a face next to the naughts and crosses section that smiled if you won, was sad if you lost and had a straight expression if you drew. My dad was always into computers he tried to explain them to me but i just wanted to play the games, he had a book which would show you the code in BASIC that let you write some games such as a maze game. I tried doing this as a young child and made a game called "dumper" it was really boring as I recall, I chose it because it was only 2 pages long, but the problem was you had to copy the code exactly else it wouldnt work. My dad had to go through the whole code trying to find what I had missed/added by mistake, id like to say the outcome was well worth it, it wasnt it sucked.
There were some good games on the commodore 16 though, video meanies, jet bricks, one man and his droid, to name but a few, these games had colour depending on what TV you played them on (which was often the spare black and white tv we had, mum only brought the big TV upstairs when Minder was on.)

I JUST FOUND AN ONLINE C16 EMULATOR - I about cried when the music came on for jetbrix
online c16 emulator

Interactive food chains for kids

I was helping my son with his science homework today. The task set was for him to create a food chain. I thought it would be cool to look online and find some interactive foodchains to assist him with his learning.
This is not a top 10 list.... I have just put my two favourites out of the ones that I found on the web.

This one was particularly good and was animated to show what happened in the food chain after the child had put the animals/plants in the correct order, It was also fuuny to see that nothing happened if you put the animals and plants in the wrong order.
Try it here

This is also a good one, It may not be as humourous as the last one but it is more realistic in many ways particularly its style.Try it here 
There is less writing in this one, but it is smaller than the bold text in the previous example.

My child particularly enjoyed learning interactively and it took him less time to learn than it would if I had gone through a diagram with him.

A long journey

One of my projects in the first year of college was to go on a journey, here are the images.